Using the Hubble space telescope's "new and highly sensitive" Cosmic Origins Spectrograph, researchers have found potential evidence that complex hydrocarbon and/or nitrile molecules may grace the surface of Pluto.

Hydrocarbons, organic compounds consisting of solely hydrogen and carbon, are considered by many to be the "building blocks of life," but that doesn't mean there is or ever was life on Pluto. According to Space.com, the compounds could have been created when sunlight or cosmic rays interacted with ice on the surface.

But the find does shed light on Pluto's color, and possibly even the color of other masses in the Kuiper Belt, where Pluto resides.

"This is an exciting finding because complex Plutonian hydrocarbons and other molecules that could be responsible for the ultraviolet spectral features we found with Hubble may, among other things, be responsible for giving Pluto its ruddy color," Alan Stern of SwRI said in a statement.